Many types of imaging devices such as thermal printers, inkjet printers, laser printers, scanners, and other like imaging devices receive stored media in the form of cut sheets. Often, such imaging devices have media supply areas that comprise racks, trays or other structures that are positioned to receive media and to properly position the media for use by the imaging device. One example of such imaging device is the Kodak Personal Picture Maker 200 ink jet photo printer sold by the Eastman Kodak Company, Rochester, N.Y. The Personal Picture Maker holds sheet media in a paper support tray that supports the media and positions the sheet media for use. The paper support tray is outside of the printer and has an open configuration to allow a user to freely access the paper in the paper support tray to add, remove, change or otherwise organize the paper.
Other printer types such as the Hewlett Packard Laser Jet 5SI, sold by Hewlett-Packard, Boise, Id. use a combination of removable bins and a paper support tray to store media. The bins are removed from the printer for loading and, after loading, the bins are reinserted into the printer. When a bin is re-inserted, the bin properly orients the media for use by the printer. This allows large volumes of media to be loaded and stored in the printer. For example, such bins are typically adapted to receive 500 or more sheets of media in a single loading operation. This greatly reduces the amount of time required to load and/or reload such printers. However, it is necessary to remove the bins from the printer in order to access the media stored therein such as where it is desired to change or reorder media. Accordingly, printers such as the LaserJet 5SI are often adapted with a separate paper support tray and loading system adapted to receive individual sheets of media. This separate paper support and loading system is used to allow the printer to maintain a single type of media in a tray while being readily adaptable to additional or other forms of media by way of the loading tray. It will be appreciated, however, that the use of such a separate loading tray increases the cost, size and complexity of the printer.
Still other types of printers use media supply cartridges that are fully or partially inserted into the printers. Such cartridges provide many of the advantages of the trays described above. Such cartridges typically use a clamshell type structure having a media holding structure and a separable containment surface that joins to the media holding structure to contain media within the cartridges. This clamshell type configuration allows a user to insert media into the clamshell by separating the containment surface from the media holding surface. However, this separation can only be made when the clamshell is removed from the printer. Accordingly, in such printers, it is not possible to access the media in a cartridge for example to load or change the media in the cartridge while such a clamshell cartridge is in the printer. In some printers, the containment surface is pivotally connected to the media holding structure. However, here too, the clamshell cartridge structure cannot be pivotally opened when the cartridge is in place on the printer.
What is needed therefore, is a media supply and imaging system that can provide the advantages of a cartridge or bin media supply yet also affords a user with the ability to access the media stored therein without requiring the user to remove the media supply re from the imaging device.